Spotless Crake

[Greg Oakley]

In my experience, this species is the hardest of our small crake species to get a decent image of - very shy, just ducking out periodically, then shooting back into the undergrowth.
D800, 300 2.8VRII, 1.7TC, 1/500, f4.8, 360ISO. Bag Hide,
Thanks, Greg.

[Randy Stout]

Greg:

Impressive feet, well exposed, I like the relatively shallow DOF.

I think the apparent sharpness of the eye could be improved by removing the left portion of the catchlight.

Congrats on capturing this elusive guy.

Cheers

Randy

[dankearl]

What an opportunity and a terrific looking bird.
I think some off the top and bottom would look nice.
A bit more sharpening of the legs and eye also.

[Alan Murphy]

Nice pose and comp. A tighter crop for me.

[Grace Scalzo]

Greg, What a beautiful bird, interesting pose and great looking eye. For the the one thing that would improve this image the most is a healthy trim from the bottom. This would eliminate some of that uninteresting mud and also decenter the bird a bit (top to bottom).

[Greg Oakley]

Thanks for the feedback guys - here is a re-post with some of your suggestions (tighter crop, less top + bottom, sharper feet, fixed eye),
Cheers, Greg

[PhilCook]

Excellent Greg, detail and that eye is brilliant and he looks almost like he's standing in a spot light. These birds are by no means common, certainly not in dry ol' South Australia, and as you say very shy and reclusive. I've only ever seen one once about 3 years ago. Very nicely done and a great one for the collection mate, top shelf Australian bird photography !

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Greg, I like the darker colour of this fellow, together with that lovely red eye, and you have exposed him very well. Good look back pose, and your repost has turned out well.